A conlang experiment - sci.lang

Viesti keskustelusta A conlang experiment

Brian M. Scott

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Lisäasetukset 3 touko 2003, 22:20

Uutisryhmät: sci.lang

Lähettäjä: b.sc...@csuohio.edu (Brian M. Scott)

Päivämäärä: Sat, 03 May 2003 19:02:22 GMT

Paikallinen: La 3 touko 2003 22:02

Aihe: Re: A conlang experiment

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On 3 May 2003 14:58:17 GMT, mr...@thereeds.org (Mark J. Reed)
wrote:

>WK = Wolf Kirchmeir <wwolf...@sympatico.can>
>MJR = Mark J. Reed <mr...@thereeds.org> (Me)
>BMS = Brian M. Scott <b.sc...@csuohio.edu>
>WK> The trouble with this definition [more inflections = more complexity]
>WK> is that it equates inflection with complexity.
>MJR> Yes, it does, but I don't see that as trouble.
>BMS> That appears to be because you simply don't recognize the
>BMS> complexity inherent in other parts of a language.
>BMS> The information conveyed by inflexions in, say, Latin or Old
>BMS> Norse still (by and large) has to be conveyed in English, for
>BMS> instance by word order and prepositional usage. The complexity
>BMS> is simply transferred from one part of the language to another.
>Yes, but rearranging words does not alter their complexity.

So what? If you want to measure the complexity of a language,
you can't limit yourself to single words; you must at the very
least consider sentences. Besides, it's extremely difficult to
come up with a definition of 'word' that makes sense
cross-linguistically. Is English 'pull off' (as in 'Can he pull
it off?') one word or two? Does it really make sense to say that
German <Ringfinger> 'ring finger' is one word, while its almost
identical English translation is two? Is French <je le vois> one
word or three? What about polysynthetic languages?

>The individual words are still readily recognizable in their new
>location, without having to be decoded from whatever inflected form
>they happen to take. With prepositional phrases, each
>word has only one form and each preposition has one form.
>This is mathematically less complex than the situation with inflections.

That is not at all clear.

>BMS> I am willing to accept the possibility that there is a meaningful
>BMS> sense in which one language is more complex than another, but it
>BMS> will have to involve the entire language, not just the
>BMS> morphology.
>Fair enough. I don't think there's any argument that Latin is more
>complex morphologically than English, so let's look at some of the ways
>English might be considered more complex than Latin:
>Articles - English has them, Latin doesn't, and it's very difficult to
>explain when their use is called for.

Indeed; so difficult that no one's done it yet.

>Multiple forms of each tense - English makes heavy use of the progressive
>forms in lieu of the simple ones, and again it is difficult to explain
>exactly when. On the other hand, English doesn't usually bother with the
>indicative/subjunctive distinction.
>Orthography - English spelling and pronunciation are at first glance
>somewhat abitrary; even when you learn the rules, they are complex and
>full of exceptions. Syllable breaks are difficult to identify, and
>even when you can identify them, the emphasis is not easily predictable.

Complexity of writing system is independent of complexity of
language; after all, most languages have never been written at
all, and some have been written in multiple systems. Stress
assignment, on the other hand, is part of the language proper,
and its irregularity does indeed add complexity.

>What else?

English word order rules. Even ordering a string of adjectives
correctly is non-trivial, however natural it may seem to one
who's grown up with it. Possibly rules of usage peculiar to a
few lexical items in a given category; I don't know how common
this is in Latin. (E.g., the 'he is to blame' construction under
discussion elsewhere and the unacceptability in most varieties of
'he might could do it'.) Proper use of the auxiliary 'do'.
Phrasal verbs that despite appearances are distinct lexical items
(e.g., 'to run out' of something).

>Is there enough complexity here to balance out the
>extra complexity in Latin morphology?

Brian

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